Rumor: Cyanogen working on its own CM phone, priced at Nexus level

Here’s a juicy rumor to spice up your afternoon. Cyanogen is supposedly working on a phone (different from the Oppo N1) that will run CyanogenMod out of the box and be priced very attractively.

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The report comes from GSM Arena and is supposedly originating from a “trusted source” that also supplied an interesting piece of information on this phone’s specifications: the device will be powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8974AC processor clocked at 2.5GHz, more than any other mobile CPU on the market now.

The device will run CyanogenMod out of the box, said the source (CyanogenMod only, we presume) and may have new software features introduced on it, that may or may not make it to other CM devices. Moreover, the device will reportedly match the price of the Nexus 5, which is $350-$400 unlocked.

A separate report from Phandroidalso claims that Cyanogen is preparing a custom device built specifically for the custom Android OS and running on Snapdragon 8974AC.

Neither report mentions the name of the hardware partner that will build the CM device, though the obvious candidate is Oppo. The up and coming Chinese phone maker will ship a version of the N1 running CM in December. A recent report from Chinese website DoNews suggests that Cyanogen and Oppo are working on a different project, and that the cooperation level between the two companies will be “unprecedented”. “Shocking” news related to the project is supposedly coming next month.

Looking up the new Snapdragon 8974AC processor reveals only one manufacturer that is working on a device powered by it – Gionee. Little known outside China, Gionee is gearing up to announce a smartphone running on 8974AC at the end of this month. However, while we can’t rule it out, we find it unlikely that Steve Kondik and his team would associate with Gionee, given how tight the relationship with Oppo seems.

Everything is just rumorware for now, so take it with the proverbial salt. But the next logical step for Cyanogen is to create a custom CyanogenMod device, so this rumor may actually have some substance to it.